you living quiet / to live in a European country, western, democratic? Well you better start get nervous, because the following text, which shows a bit of the living conditions of women workers in Guatemala is no more no less than that, quietly, is being installed in our paradise of wellbeing.
Insults, which are often uttered aloud, accompanied by pressures are sabotaging their work, stealing shares or transferring them to the worst areas of work where they are forced to lift heavy loads to despair and after that, giving in to sexual blackmail, which suffer daily within that industry.
Tania Palencia, a sociologist, describes in his research entitled "A full stomach does not believe in hunger of others" how in the maquilas to intolerance persists pregnancies of female employees, abuse, forcing them to meet employment goals under threat, or economic sanctions if they get sick and miss work.
Lilian Solis, Gender Unit of the Ministry of Labour, is corroborated, the public entity has received at least 255 complaints in a year for this type of abuse.
Guatemala has the largest textile industry in the region within which there are about 40 companies among textile and spinning, annually producing 165 million in textiles and 27 million in thread and yarn.
live in this region most indigenous women, but also the mestizos are contracted by these companies.
Lilian says that not all dare to carry out the petition when they work, because they are afraid of being left with nothing, because the run (fired) from employment immediately.
For example, the worker Lorena Simon, did not dare to speak until the company he worked for shut down of the overnight and left 800 people on the street and no payment.
"They controlled the time to go to the bathroom. Almost did not let us drink (water) and missing a day to get social security we removed $ 30 salary," said the study "A full stomach does not believe in hunger of others" documenting the status of the maquilas in Guatemala.
The Guatemalan maquila textile or agricultural fail to earn even the minimum wage of around $ 250, and the monthly salary ranges between 150 and 200 dollars.
Maritza Velásquez, the Association of Domestic Workers at Home and Sweatshops, said SEMlac that wage workers are affected every weekend because when you, the employer makes them discounts capricious.
abuse, pressure, blackmail, harassment are the elements that make up a sweatshop in this Central American country, where the rules change when it comes to hiring a woman.
Having 30 years of age, female and uneducated is synonymous of unusable for some industrial sectors and in the case of the maquilas is confirmed, Olga tells Marta Rodriguez, who advised the working groups to improve the use of sweatshops by the Commission on Women's Congress.
SEMlac Velásquez told that, in the early eighties, the factory workers were 82 percent of the workforce, but today that number has dropped, as there is a bias in recruitment of young males, because they have more physical ability to achieve goals and do not ask permission strenuous often due to family commitments or pregnancy.
The profile of a Guatemalan who works in maquilas is the component of poverty: they live in marginal areas, did not finish primary school and has no right. Similarly, women whose mothers never had access to the study and were content to sell vegetables or washing and ironing in private homes.
addition, Maritza said that the textile maquila is where the largest population of labor, so it is where there is more exploitation, abuse, repression of the organization, and harassment to get the goals in time. And in many cases women are forced to work over 10 hours a day, seven days a week, for just $ 85 biweekly.
According to the Commission Industry Clothing and Textiles (Vestex), an entity comprising all the maquila employers in this country, supports and endorses the opening of textile companies, more than half of the maquilas are in this order, of Korean, American and Guatemalan.
Vestex has recorded 156 garment factories, with an installed capacity of 59.900 machines and a workforce of 56.702 employees. The main areas of operation are located to the west.
But there are 271 companies and service suppliers accessories that are part of this cluster, in activities such as screen printing, embroidery, labels, chemicals, dyers, textile laboratories, among others.
Most of the textile and clothing industry is located in the metropolitan region and in the surrounding area, a distance of no more than 30 minutes from the capital city.
The study "A full stomach, do not believe in hunger of others' points out that currently, women who have passed 30 years of age, are rejected because they tend to get sick, and the employer is doing everything possible to ensure that their staff maintained for long hours.
But Lilian Solis, an official of the Ministry of Labour, contradicts that and says that 85 percent of the workforce in the maquiladoras are women, and that these are single heads of households and mothers which should cover basic expenses, payment for services, education and health, with a daily wage of $ 7.05.
Floridalma Contreras, Area Women's Center for Legal Action on Human Rights, said that in the past six years in Guatemala were processed 45,196 complaints of the maquiladora labor.
Carla Caballeros, Vestex manager believes that one can not generalize, and that companies belonging to this guild conform to a code of conduct and that everyone should follow.
Despite the situation they face, Tania Palencia points out in his research work in the maquila industry has allowed growth of Guatemalan women in their inner strength because their wages empowers them to survive if their husbands abandon them, to give value and separated from their partners (if abused) or decide to have a child and choose not to live with the father.
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